Dail Caller
- Its no secret that public opinion on the issue of same
sex marriage is rapidly changing: a clear majority of Americans
now support it, a development unthinkable just a few years ago.
Even a large number of Republicans are now in support, including
over 60 percent of Republican Millennials, those under 30.

Over 40
percent of evangelical Millennials also support it, and there
are even growing cracks in the wall of opposition among social
conservative and evangelical leaders. One of the latest to throw
in the towel is Carmen Fowler LaBerge, a former Presbyterian
minister who heads the Presbyterian Lay Committee, a group of
conservative congregations who broke away from the Presbyterian
Church after it voted last year to ordain noncelibate gay clergy.

LaBerge
recently told the Washington Times that she believes there is
now a consensus within the evangelical movement that the culture
war on traditional marriage has been lost, and the overwhelming
support for same-sex marriage among younger voters would seem
to indicate that. Freely admitting that the marriage battle has
been won by supporters of SSM, she and fellow evangelicals are
turning their attention to a different battle, the one to protect
their own religious freedoms, including keeping their churches
free of any mandates involving gay rights or same-sex marriage.
Although in her view the Bible is clear on homosexuality and
traditional marriage, she nonetheless concedes that I dont
live in a country thats governed by that document; I live
in a country thats governed by the Constitution.

The largest-ever
study of same-sex parents found their children turn out healthier
and happier than the general population.

A new
study of 315 same-sex parents and 500 children in Australia found
that, after correcting for socioeconomic factors, the children
fared well on several measures, including asthma, dental care,
behavioral issues, learning, sleep, and speech.

""what
this means is that people take on roles that are suited to their
skill sets rather than falling into those gender stereotypes""

At the
same time, two-thirds of the parents reported a perceived stigma
on at least one issue tracked by the survey. These stigmas ranged
from other people gossiping about an LGBT family to same-sex
parents feeling excluded at social gatherings due to their sexual
orientation.

Perceived
stigmas were associated with worse scores for physical activity,
mental health, family cohesion, and emotional outcomes. The stigmas,
however, were not prevalent enough to negatively tilt the children's
outcomes in a comparison to outcomes across the general population.

The study,
however, comes with some caveats. The findings are based on reports
from the parents who agreed to the survey, which could skew the
results. The survey also focused on Australian same-sex parents,
so there may be social and cultural factors at play that wouldn't
apply perfectly to America's gay and lesbian parents. And the
study doesn't compare same-sex parents directly with opposite-sex
parents; it instead compares same-sex parents and their children
to the general population.

SCIENTIFIC
BLOGGING - Opponents of gay marriage in the United States state
that nuclear families have always been the standard household
form. Turns out this may not be true. While gay marriage itself
may not have happened in medieval times there is evidence that
homosexual civil unions did and that could lend important historical
insight to the debate.

Allan
A. Tulchin of Shippensburg University writes on the topic in
the September issue of Journal of Modern History and reviews
historical evidence, including documents and gravesites, suggesting
that homosexual civil unions may have existed 600 years ago in
France. . .

As
an example, he states in late medieval France the term 'affrèrement'
- roughly translated as 'brotherment' - was used to refer to
a certain type of legal contract, which also existed elsewhere
in Mediterranean Europe. . . The new "brothers" pledged
to live together sharing 'un pain, un vin, et une bourse' - one
bread, one wine, and one purse. As Tulchin notes, "The model
for these household arrangements is that of two or more brothers
who have inherited the family home on an equal basis from their
parents and who will continue to live together, just as they
did when they were children." But at the same time, "the
affrèrement was not only for brothers," since many
other people, including relatives and non-relatives, used it.

WDMA
- The Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance seeks to defend
equal marriage in this state by challenging the Washington Supreme
Court's ruling on Andersen v. King County. This decision, given
in July 2006, declared that a "legitimate state interest"
allows the Legislature to limit marriage to those couples able
to have and raise children together. Because of this "legitimate
state interest," it is permissible to bar same-sex couples
from legal marriage.

The
way we are challenging Andersen is unusual: using the initiative,
we are working to put the court's ruling into law. We will do
this through three initiatives. The first would make procreation
a requirement for legal marriage. The second would prohibit divorce
or legal separation when there are children. The third would
make the act of having a child together the legal equivalent
of a marriage ceremony.

By
getting the initiatives passed, we hope the Supreme Court will
strike them down as unconstitutional and thus weaken Andersen
itself. And at the very least, it should be good fun to see the
social conservatives who have long screamed that marriage exists
for the sole purpose of procreation be forced to choke on their
own rhetoric. Initiative 957

If
passed by Washington voters, the Defense of Marriage Initiative
would:

-
add the phrase, "who are capable of having children with
one another" to the legal definition of marriage

-
require that couples married in Washington file proof of procreation
within three years of the date of marriage or have their marriage
automatically annulled

-
require that couples married out of state file proof of procreation
within three years of the date of marriage or have their marriage
classed as "unrecognized;"

-
establish a process for filing proof of procreation

-
make it a criminal act for people in an unrecognized marriage
to receive marriage benefits.

http://www.wa-doma.org/Default.aspx

DECEMBER
2006

THE
REAL REASON MARRIAGE MAY BE IN TROUBLE

SAVAGE
MINDS - To anthropologists, the way marriage is discussed and
deployed in these debates is laughable. We know that marriage
as conceptualized by the American religious right at the dawn
of the 21st century is neither the only - or even a particularly
common - form of marriage in the world, nor the way marriage
has always been in our own society. The Biblical marriage that
religious conservatives hold up as their example and guiding
principle would be (and is) almost universally condemned by today's
Christians. Jacob, the central patriarch of the Biblical Hebrews,
would be jailed as a bigamist today; the acceptance of Utah into
the Union on the condition that they outlaw polygamy is demonstration
enough that we view Biblical marriage norms as literally un-American.
Marriage today is drastically different than it was even a century
ago, even a half-century ago. A small extremist fringe contingent
apart, few Americans would consider the marriage-as-property-arrangement
attitude of the 19th century to be truly reflective of our modern
notions of freedom and individual fulfillment. And hardly anyone
would advocate a return to the way marriage was in the 1950's,
when teen pregnancy was at its peak and fully 1 of 3 marriages
involved a pregnant bride. Whatever one thinks of single parenting,
I find it unlikely that most Americans would prefer marriage
to be thought of primarily as something teenagers do when they
get knocked up.

Be
that as it may, I think conservatives are right about one thing:
if the institution of marriage is going to survive, it does need
defending. Not because marriage is the only or best source of
truly moral living, but precisely the opposite: marriage is increasingly
irrelevant in modern society. In the absence of many good reasons
for marriage to even exist, those who value it as a tradition
are going to be more and more hard-pressed to perpetuate it.
. .

For
the most part, marriage is meaningful in societies where food-production
is labor-intensive and dependent on carefully-monitored social
rules, which means mainly agricultural and pastoral (herding)
societies. . . Marriage is so important in these kinds of society
because the need for social networks through which labor and
trading can be arranged is so important. . .

Close
bonds between families are precisely what you do not want in
an industrial society dependent on the mobility of labor to survive.
Anthropologists have long noted that modern Westerners have much
more similarity to foragers such as the Ju'/huansi and Hadza
of Africa than we do to our pre-industrial ancestors of just
a few generations ago. Foragers are typically organized into
small, highly mobile groups whose membership fluctuates as the
availability of resources changes - groups may swell during times
of plentiful resources, and break up into smaller when resources
get scarcer. . . .

Time
was when the nuclear family - a man, his wife, and their 2 -
3 children- was the natural ideal for life in an industrial society.
The needs of the household - income, procurement of goods, child-rearing,
food-preparation, social involvement, housekeeping - were split
up between the husband and wife, allowing the man to participate
as fully as possible in the labor market while passing the responsibility
for reproduction of both his labor (feeding, clothing, and taking
care of him so he can go back to work the next day) and of society
as a whole (creating a new generation of labor so the society
can continue to function) to the woman. But this ideal was scarce
- peaking at just over 50% of American households in the '50s
and '60s and accounting for only a quarter of US households today
- and dependent on a whole range of social, economic, and political
interventions in the operation of the market that today are branded
by many "un-American": strong labor unions, strong
government regulation of business practices, heavy government
investment in education, legal limitations on divorce and adultery,
government-subsidized housing development and welfare systems,
and so on. . .

If
we run down the functions that anthropologists typically cite
for marriage, we see that other institutions in our society meet
nearly all of them, often better than marriage itself does. .
. The huge number of single mothers (and much smaller number
of single fathers) show that child-rearing can be performed quite
effectively outside of marriage, and much of our child-rearing
is handled by schools and other institutions anyway. Sexual access
has already moved far beyond the bounds of marriage, with nearly
every American having sexual relations outside of marriage at
some point in their lives. Finally, the emotional satisfaction
and sense of security that can be provided by marriage is apparently
fleeting, with half of all marriages ending in divorce, and a
goodly number of marriages harboring psychological, physical,
and sexual abuse. Many people today find just as satisfying relationships
with partners to whom they are not married, whether by legal
restriction (e.g. same-sex partners) or by choice.

http://savageminds.org/2006/06/21/the-end-of-marriage/

JUNE
2006

POCKET
PARADIGM

The
simple solution: if you don't like gay marriage, don't marry
a gay. - Sam Smith

SENATORIAL
INQUIRY

Sam
Smith

1.
The Ten Commandments outlaw killing and adultery but that doesn't
seem to bother your colleagues as much as gay marriage. Why do
you think the Ten Commandments are less important to them than
the gay marriage?

2.
Would you accept a compromise in which we outlawed not only gay
marriages but support of deadly wars or cheating on your wife?
If not, why not?

3.
The Ten Commandants say "You can work during the six weekdays
and do all your tasks. But the seventh day is a Sabbath to God
your Lord. Do not do anything that constitutes work. [This includes]
you, your son, your daughter, your slave, your maid, your animal,
and the foreigner in your gates." You have not yet formalized
this into a constitutional amendment and so your maids, slaves,
animals and proximate foreigners are running around hog wild
on Sundays. Isn't this more dangerous than a few gays getting
married and shouldn't you tackle it first?

4.
Exodus tells us to kill those who work on Sunday. This seems
to conflict with the federal code, not to mention the Ten Commandments.
Shouldn't we worry more about the need for increased Seventh
Day slaughter than about gay marriage?

4.
Since religions differ sharply on this issue, if this amendment
passes it will directly conflict with the First Amendment which
says, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment
of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."
Which one should we then follow?

5.
Since Republicans believe so firmly in the sanctity of marriage,
how do you explain the following from the New York Daily News
in August 2004: "With thousands of Republicans set to invade
the city this summer, high-priced escorts and strippers are preparing
for one grand old party. Agencies are flying in extra call girls
from around the globe to meet the expected demand during the
Aug. 30-Sept. 2 gathering at Madison Square Garden."

6.
Explain the moral difference between a Republican politician
opposing gay marriage and one participating in gay sex which,
according to police and news reports, happens from time to time.
Do we need an amendment preserving the sanctity of illicit sex?

7.
If this were 1956 instead of 2006, would you have supported a
ban on inter-racial marriages, which most states had? How does
the current amendment differ in spirit - rather than merely the
target - from the one proposed in 1911: "Intermarriage between
negroes or persons of color and Caucasians . . . within the United
States . . . is forever prohibited."

8.
Have you ever had contact with a woman during her period of menstrual
uncleanliness, something outlawed by the Bible? Should we have
a constitutional amendment to prevent this sort of thing from
happening again?

9.
How would you deal with the issue raised by Professor Emeritus
James Kaufman of the University of Virginia: "Lev. 25:44
states that I may indeed possess slaves, both male and female,
provided they are purchased from neighboring nations." Do
you think this biblical right should be also codified in a constitutional
amendment? How will this affect our plans for construction of
a border wall?

10.
Leviticus reminds us of other sins far more prevalent than gay
marriage. For example, "These shall ye eat of all that are
in the waters: whatsoever hath fins and scales in the waters,
in the seas, and in the rivers, them shall ye eat. And all that
have not fins and scales in the seas, and in the rivers, of all
that move in the waters, and of any living thing which is in
the waters, they shall be an abomination unto you. . . ye shall
not eat of their flesh, but ye shall have their carcasses in
abomination." Do we need a constitutional amendment to ban
the eating of shrimp, crab, lobster, clams & mussels?

11.
Homosexuality has been found by scientists in 450 other species.
Isn't it a bit late to be trying to suppress it in ours?

12.
If gay marriages produce some gay children, why do heterosexual
marriages do the same?

13.
Since we're going back to first principles, would you mind adding
a section that makes wives the husband's property?

14.
Which of these other steps - all Biblically endorsed - should
be taken to preserve the sanctity of marriage: allowing men to
take on concubines in addition to their wives, stoning to death
any new wife found not to be a virgin, requiring women to marry
the man who raped them, banning interfaith marriages, and banning
divorce?

15.
Given the foregoing, is it fair to describe those pushing the
marriage amendment as heretical, hypocritical and blasphemous
Christians? History shows that such people are far more dangerous,
on average, than gays. Shouldn't we do something about them before
we worry about those gay weddings?

THE
SANCTITY OF MARRIAGE IN THE NATION'S CAPITAL

AN
exchange on the DC History bulletin board on why Washington attracted
so many weddings reveals just how the sanctity of marriage used
to be observed in the nation's capital right under the nose of
the sort of legislators now demanding a constitutional amendment
to preserve the sanctity of marriage. In fact, DC at the time
was both under the complete control of Congress and a sort of
East Coast Vegas

MICHAEL
WASSERMAN - Based on my review of the statute applicable between
1901 and 1925, it seems to me that the reason [for easy marriages
in DC] was the combination of (1) the slight requirements for
obtaining a marriage license; (2) the absence of any waiting
period or residency requirement; (3) the apparent validity under
D.C. law of even an unlicensed marriage; (4) the rather small
penalty imposed on the officiant of an unlicensed marriage (up
to a $500 fine, no possibility of jail); (5) the apparent absence
of any penalty on the parties to an unlicensed marriage; (6)
the low age of consent for a valid marriage (16 for males and
14 for females); (7) the absence of any requirement for witnesses.
. .

Section
1291 specified the requirements for obtaining a license from
the clerk of the court. All that was needed was for the parties
to answer under oath a series of questions regarding their identity
and capacity to marry each other: ages, consanguinity, prior
marriage, parental consent if under age (21 for men, 18 for women).
If the questions are answered correctly, the clerk must issue
a license.

Section
1288 allowed marriages to be celebrated by any "minister
of the gospel"--who needn't be a resident of the District--"authorized
by any justice of the supreme court of the District of Columbia,"
which was the trial court with general jurisdiction. The 1904
amendment made provision for members of religious societies "which
does not by its custom require the intervention of a minister
for celebration of marriages."

There
doesn't seem to have even been a requirement that the marriage
be witnessed by anyone other than the officiant.

Moreover,
if the boy were between 16 and 21 or the girl between 14 and
18, but didn't have parental consent, they could still get married
without a license as long as they found a "minister of the
gospel" (previously authorized by a justice) who was willing
to run the risk of a $500 fine, imposed by section 1290. (Of
course, the minister was likely to be the only resident of the
District who witnessed the "crime," although even that
wasn't necessarily so.)

Sections
1283 and 1284 specify which marriages are absolutely void or
merely voidable after judicial decree. Neither includes the absence
of a license. Only purported marriages involving incest or bigamy
were absolutely ineffectual. Marriages could be judicially declared
void based only on mental or physical incapacity (i.e., inability
to consent to or consummate a marriage) or if consent of a party
was obtained by fraud. The fourth paragraph of section 1284 (added
in 1902) specifically declares the age of consent to marriage
to be 16 for males and 14 for females, and makes marriages in
which one party is under age voidable at the suit of the party.

Section
1290 is the only section dealing with the consequence of the
absence of a license. It provided: "No person authorized
hereby to celebrate the rites of marriage shall do so in any
case without first having delivered to him a license therefor
addressed to him issued from the clerk's office ..., under a
penalty of not more than five hundred dollars, in the discretion
of the court, to be recovered upon information in the police
court of the District." In fact, it may have been possible
for anyone to "celebrate" a valid marriage, because
section 1289 provides that anyone without proper authorization
under section 1288 was subject merely to a $500 fine as well.
It does not address whether the marriage so celebrated was or
was not otherwise valid.

So,
if you wanted to get married quickly and with a minimum of fuss
-- and questions, D.C. was the place to be.

WILLIAM
WRIGHT - Though there were couples from Pennsylvania and elsewhere,
including New York, the majority of those coming here seemed
to be from Virginia; there was even what the Post called the
"Cupid Special," a train from Richmond that arrived
every spring for more than twenty years. Most women on the train
who were identified were under 21, but there were some exceptions.

http://www2.h-net.msu.edu/~dclist/

ANOTHER
PROBLEM: LAWS CAN'T DEFINE 'MAN' & 'WOMAN'

WILLIAM
O. BEEMAN, PACIFIC NEWS SERVICE - There are at least three ways
one might try to codify gender under law -- biologically, psychologically
and culturally. On close inspection, all of them fail.

Biologically,
one must choose either secondary sexual characteristics -- things
like facial hair for men or breast development for women -- or
genetic testing as defining markers of gender. Neither method
is clear-cut. Some women show male secondary characteristics,
and vice versa. Before puberty, things are not necessarily any
clearer. A significant proportion of all babies have ambiguous
gender development. It has been long-standing -- and now, increasingly,
controversial -- medical practice to surgically "reassign"
such babies shortly after birth so that they will have only one
set of sexual organs . . . .

Psychologically,
another dilemma for those who seek to codify gender is the condition
known as gender dysphoria, in which a person feels that their
true gender is the opposite of that in which they were born.
These individuals are often referred to as "transgendered."
Some experts estimate as many as 1.2 million Americans are transgendered.
Gender dysphoria is a matter of personal identity and has nothing
to do with sexual orientation. A male-to-female transgendered
person may be attracted to women or to men. . . .

Finally,
human societies around the world recognize individuals who are
culturally female or culturally male no matter what their physical
gender. The "berdache" is an umbrella term used by
Europeans to designate a man who is culturally classified as
a woman, and who may be a "wife" to another man. The
practice is perhaps best known among the Zuñ Indians of
Arizona, but is widely seen in other tribal groups as well. Outside
of North America, the hijra of India, a cultural "third
gender," is important in ceremonial life. Hijra are classified
as "neither man nor woman,"

BBC
- Gay marriage could boost the mental and physical health of
homosexuals, doctors believe. Rates of depression, drug abuse
and cancer are higher in the gay community than among heterosexual
people. The report said civil partnerships, which were introduced
in England and Wales in December, were likely to reduce prejudice
and social exclusion. The Journal of Epidemiology and Community
Health article was based on previous studies in other countries.

Professor
Michael King, of University College London, who co-wrote the
article, said: "Civil partnerships are likely to break down
some of the prejudice and promote greater understanding, including
among staff working in the health service. Legal civil partnerships
could increase the stability of same sex relationships and minimize
the social exclusion to which gay and lesbian people are often
subjected."

Research
has shown that lesbians have higher risk of breast cancer, heart
disease and obesity, while gay men have a higher risk of HIV,
the article said.
Gay people are also more likely to suffer from depression, drug
abuse and suicidal urges than heterosexual people.

JOSE
MARTINEZ, NY DAILY NEWS - With thousands of Republicans set to
invade the city this summer, high-priced escorts and strippers
are preparing for one grand old party. Agencies are flying in
extra call girls from around the globe to meet the expected demand
during the Aug. 30-Sept. 2 gathering at Madison Square Garden.
"We have girls from London, Seattle, California, all coming
in for that week," said a madam at a Manhattan escort service.
"It's the week everyone wants to work." "It's
going to be big," agreed one operator at a midtown escort
service. . .

PATRICK
LETELLIER, PLANET OUT - A coalition of Latino civil rights leaders
and organizations declared their opposition Wednesday to the
proposed U.S. constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.
At a press conference on Capitol Hill, coalition organizers condemned
the amendment and emphasized the longstanding support for gay
civil rights in America's Latino communities.

The
event began with a video clip of United Farm Workers leader Cesar
Chavez addressing a crowd of several hundred thousand at the
1987 march for gay rights in Washington, D.C. "We want to
shatter the notion that Latinos do not support civil rights for
gays and lesbians," said Martin Ornelas-Quintero, director
of the National Latina/o Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender
Organization, which organized the event. "Our leaders and
people have been supportive of gay rights for decades,"
he said. . . A Field Poll of California voters in February found
that 57 percent of Latinos opposed amending the U.S. Constitution
to ban same-sex marriages, while only 53 percent of non-Hispanic
whites opposed the amendment.

VIFH
- The Virginia General Assembly passed a law April 21 banning
all contracts between partners in homosexual relationships. Not
just marriage, all contracts. At the center of HB 751 is this
language:

"A
civil union, partnership contract or other arrangement between
persons of the same sex purporting to bestow the privileges or
obligations of marriage is prohibited. Any such civil union,
partnership contract or other arrangement entered into by persons
of the same sex in another state or jurisdiction shall be void
in all respects in Virginia and any contractual rights created
thereby shall be void and unenforceable."

This
law not only prohibits civil marriage between same-sex partners,
but actively seeks invalidate any and all legal contracts between
these individuals. Durable powers of attorney, health care directives,
even wills and property contracts are at jeopardy now that this
law has been passed.

We
aim to make being based in Virginia just as difficult for companies
as it is for gay and lesbian couples. Did these companies do
anything wrong themselves? Probably not. Nothing more wrong than
the gay couples whose rights the Commonwealth of Virginia is
abrogating. If these companies find our efforts unjust, they
can take their newly sharpened sense of justice to the General
Assembly and plead for redress--and for the withdrawal of HB
751. There are lots of companies with significant operations
in Virginia. We're starting with an easy (if altogether innocent)
target, J. Crew, a company many of us have patronized generously
throughout the years. (That's right, boys and girls, until Virginia
wakes up and restores the rule of law, no self-respecting homo
will be seen in a roll-neck sweater or barn jacket.)

NICK
GILLESPIE, HIT & RUN - As Senate Republicans get set to execute
a "full-court push to educate the public on the importance
of marriage" by holding interminable hearings on the topic,
they'll no doubt be looking for matrimonially friendly witnesses
from the GOP ranks. Among the individual sessions they'll be
running over the next few weeks are "Healthy Marriage: What
is it and why should we promote it?"; "The Benefits
of Healthy Marriage"; and "What social science can
tell us about marriage, divorce and children."

No
doubt the first witness on their list was the Senate's own sexual
Iron Man, the multiply hitched and notoriously priapic segregationist
Sen. Strom "Sperm" Thurmond (R-S.C.). But he's dead,
missed even by the love child who posthumously complicated Strom's
grotesque legacy of fomenting race-based hate in this sweet land
of liberty.

But
if the Senate is willing to dip into America's House of Commons,
they can always interview folks like Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.)
about how important marriage is. Or better yet, ask the Hoosier's
illegitimate kid about how important parents can be--especially,
parents who actually acknowledge and support their out-of-wedlock
children.

And
the Senate Republicans might call in former Speaker of the House
Newt Gingrich for some riveting Whittaker Chambers-style testimony
about the desanctification of marriage from one who knows the
real deal. Gingrich, who doesn't seem to be doing very much these
days anyway, once railed against Democrats for espousing "Woody
Allen family values." That was back when Newt was only on
wife number two (the one he married after dumping wife number
one, his former high school math teacher). Now that he's on number
three (happily wed to a former staffer), he surely has plenty
of insight on the marriage issue.

As
do a raft of other Republicans, including short-lived Speaker
of the House and phone-sex freak Bob Livingston; former Sen.
Helen Chenoweth (who helped put the 'ho back in Idaho during
an extramarital affair for which she says God has forgiven her);
Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.); and many more, no doubt to be named
later by Larry Flynt after he stops fighting with fellow pornographer
Rob Black over Reason's May cover story (on newsstands now).

LETTER
TO DR. LAURA

Dear
Dr. Laura:

Thank
you for doing so much to educate people regarding God's Law.
I have learned a great deal from your show, and try to share
that knowledge with as many people as I can. When someone tries
to defend the homosexual lifestyle, for example, I simply remind
them that Leviticus 18:22 clearly states it to be an abomination.
... End of debate. I do need some advice from you, however, regarding
some other elements of God's Law and how to follow them:

1.
When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I know it creates
a pleasing odor for the Lord - Lev.1:9. The problem is my neighbors.
They claim the odor is not pleasing to them. Should I smite them?

2.
I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as sanctioned
in Exodus 21:7. In this day and age, what do you think would
be a fair price for her?

3.
I know that I am allowed no contact with a woman while she is
in her period of menstrual uncleanliness - Lev.15: 19-24. The
problem is how do I tell? I have tried asking, but most women
take offense.

4.
Lev. 25:44 states that I may indeed possess slaves, both male
and female, provided they are purchased from neighboring nations.
A friend of mine claims that this applies to Mexicans, but not
Canadians. Can you clarify? Why can't I own Canadians?

5.
I have a neighbor who insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus
35:2. The passage clearly states he should be put to death. Am
I morally obligated to kill him myself?

6.
A friend of mine feels that even though eating shellfish is an
abomination - Lev. 11:10, it is a lesser abomination than homosexuality.
I don't agree. Can you settle this? Are there 'degrees' of abomination?

7.
Lev. 21:20 states that I may not approach the altar of God if
I have a defect in my sight. I have to admit that I wear reading
glasses. Does my vision have to be 20/20, or is there some wiggle
room here?

8.
Most of my male friends get their hair trimmed, including the
hair around their temples, even though this is expressly forbidden
by Lev.19:27. How should they die?

9.
I know from Lev. 11:6-8 that touching the skin of a dead pig
makes me unclean, but may I still play football if I wear gloves?

10.
My uncle has a farm. He violates Lev. 19:19 by planting two different
crops in the same field, as does his wife by wearing garments
made of two different kinds of thread (cotton/poly). He also
tends to curse and blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that
we go to all the trouble of getting the whole town together to
stone them? - Lev.24:10-16. Couldn't we just burn them to death
at a private family affair like we do with people who sleep with
their in-laws? (Lev. 20:14)

I
know you have studied these things extensively and thus enjoy
considerable expertise in such matters, so I am confident you
can help. Thank you again for reminding us that God's word is
eternal and unchanging.

JOHN
BORNEMAN AND LAURIE KAIN HART IN WASHINGTON POST - In the 1860s
New York lawyer and anthropologist Louis Henry Morgan attempted
a systematic cross-cultural study of the institution of marriage.
Morgan's data were imperfect, but he was able to demonstrate
that the record of human societies showed a startling diversity
of socially approved forms of marriage. All societies had some
form of regularized partnership, but no single standard human
form could be identified. Generally, even within a society, there
was a certain elasticity of marriage forms.

The
most famous of these unions were the ones most foreign to Western
Victorian society: marriage between a woman and several men;
marriage between a man and several women; forms of "visiting"
marriage, whereby a man might visit his wife but not live with
her. As anthropologists assembled more reliable data, they found
it difficult to produce a definition of human marriage that would
hold true for all its socially legitimate forms. . .

As
for sex, rarely if ever has marriage been able to restrict its
varied practice to the relation of man and wife. In most cases,
anthropologists agreed, what counted was that some socially approved
form of marriage provided a secure place for the child in the
social order.

But
marriage has not been solely about children. In most societies
known to us, everyone marries; it is an expected rite of passage
and part of the normal life course of all adults. Only in post-classical
Western societies do we find high numbers of unmarried people.
Unlike other peoples, we consider marriage -- however desirable
or undesirable -- optional.

MICHAEL
POWELL WASHINGTON POST - Some days, as he watches gay men button
their tuxes and lesbians slip into wedding gowns, gay rights
activist William Dobbs feels like screaming. "Some gay activist
in California called for mass civil disobedience until we get
the right to marry," Dobbs said, his voice growing louder.
"God! What could be more dreary?" . . .

"Our
movement has become about lusting for weddings and lavender picket
fences," he said. "It's so embarrassing -- I feel like
turning in my gay card." The gay rights activists and theorists
and feminists who critique the campaign from the left are the
voices less often heard in the battle over gay marriage. These
critics are not opposed to gay marriage -- none would deny the
emotional tug of marriage for tens of thousands of gay couples.
But they are mortified at the fate of a revolution pasteurized.
They wonder what happened to championing sexual freedom and universal
health care, and upending patriarchy?

As
the gay revolution moves from leather bars and ACT UP sit-ins
to the marriage registry at Bed Bath & Beyond, the middle-class
makeover can be disorienting. Jim Eigo, a radical gay rights
activist, framed the dilemma a few years back: "What's the
use of being queer if you can't be different?"

GOD
HATES SHRIMP - Shrimp, crab, lobster, clams, mussels, all these
are an abomination before the Lord, just as gays are an abomination.
Why stop at protesting gay marriage? Bring all of God's law unto
the heathens and the sodomites. We call upon all Christians to
join the crusade against Long John Silver's and Red Lobster.
Yea, even Popeye's shall be cleansed. The name of Bubba shall
be anathema. We must stop the unbelievers from destroying the
sanctity of our restaurants.

Leviticus
11:9-12 says: "These shall ye eat of all that are in the
waters: whatsoever hath fins and scales in the waters, in the
seas, and in the rivers, them shall ye eat. And all that have
not fins and scales in the seas, and in the rivers, of all that
move in the waters, and of any living thing which is in the waters,
they shall be an abomination unto you: They shall be even an
abomination unto you; ye shall not eat of their flesh, but ye
shall have their carcasses in abomination. Whatsoever hath no
fins nor scales in the waters, that shall be an abomination unto
you.

Deuteronomy
14:9-10 says: "These ye shall eat of all that are in the
waters: all that have fins and scales shall ye eat: And whatsoever
hath not fins and scales ye may not eat; it is unclean unto you."

WONKETTE
- Right after Bush announced his support of the amendment declaring
gays and lesbians to count as 3/5 of a person, we heard rumblings
about gay administration appointees resigning en masse. Apparently,
he has: The Washington Blade reports that Donald Capoccia has
stepped down in protest over the proposed amendment.

RENFORD
REESE, THE SOCIO-POLITICAL CONTEXT OF THE INTEGRATION OF SPORT
IN AMERICA:
Jack Johnson, the first black heavyweight champion, he held the
heavyweight title for seven years before losing it Jess Willard
in Cuba in 1915. [The famous James Earl Jones' movie "The
Great White Hope" was based on Johnson's life.] Johnson
had a profound effect on race relations. His flamboyant personality
and his incessant appetite for confrontation and white women
ultimately led to his demise. Johnson married three white women
and had numerous affairs with others. He was fearless and had
little respect for the conventions of the day.

It
was this behavior that earned him the name "Bad Nigger."
A bad nigger, in black folklore, was a black man who did not
play by the rules of convention; they dressed well and had unquenchable
sex drives. They lived hedonistic lifestyles with a blatant disregard
for death or danger. The term was used a badge of reverence among
blacks.

In
December of 1908, Johnson beat Tommy Burns in Sydney, Australia
for the heavy weigh title. In 1910, he beat former heavyweight
champion, Jim Jeffries so badly that it humiliated whites. Not
only did he beat him, but he taunted him and rubbed in the face
of white Americans. Race riots ensued all over America as a result
of this event.

Because
of Johnson's arrogance and love for white women, many whites
considered him a serious threat to racial order. After Johnson
married Lucille Cameron (a white woman), two ministers in the
South recommended lynching him. In a reaction to the Johnson-Cameron
marriage, in 1911 Rep. Seaborn Roddenberry of Georgia introduced
a constitutional amendment to ban interracial marriages. In his
appeal to congress, Roddenberry stated that "Intermarriage
between whites and blacks is repulsive and averse to every sentiment
of pure American spirit. It is abhorrent and repugnant. It is
subversive to social peace. It is destructive of moral supremacy,
and ultimately this slavery to black beasts will bring this nation
to a fatal conflict". Influenced by Roddenberry and others,
miscegenation bills were introduced in 1913 in half of the twenty
states where this law did not exist.

INTERNET
SIGHTINGSWHY
HOMOSEXUAL MARRIAGE SHOULDN'T BE LEGAL

Homosexuality
is not natural, much like eyeglasses, polyester, and birth control.

Heterosexual
marriages are valid because they produce children. Infertile
couples and old people can't legally get married because the
world needs more children.

WONKETTE
- Stop Him Before He Marries Again - The mayor of New Paltz,
NY has been charged with 19 criminal counts for marrying same-sex
couples. So this is what people were talking about when they
referred to the "same-sex marriage frenzy." He is accused
of "solemnizing a marriage without a license," which
does sound kinda dirty. Anyways, we're just glad this serial
solemnizer has been stopped. Who knows how many couples he could
have united in a lifelong pledge of commitment, or what kind
of bridesmaids dresses they would have made friends buy? (Meanwhile,
the guy who married my parents is walking around a free man.)

ANDREW JACOBS, NY TIMES - Georgia's
headlong rush to block gay marriages through a constitutional
amendment has been stalled, for the moment, by an unlikely group
of legislators: black members of the House of Representatives,
many of them church deacons and ministers who already support
the state's laws banning same-sex marriage. Last week, they provided
39 of 50 no votes and abstentions that helped the measure fall
3 votes short of the 120 needed for passage... "In my 30
years in the legislature, I don't think I've seen a vote so close
and so impassioned," said Representative Calvin Smyre, chairman
of the House Rules Committee, who is black. The battle over gay
marriage here has put African-American lawmakers in a difficult
position with voters and placed them in stark contrast to their
white Democratic colleagues, most of whom have joined Republicans
in calling for a constitutional bulwark against same-sex marriage.
Many constituents, including their hometown church leaders, have
been clamoring for them to approve the measure, but the state's
Legislative Black Caucus has largely come to see it as denigrating
a minority while playing into the hands of conservative Republicans
seeking to spark a large turnout of their base in November. "I'm
a pastor and I don't support gay marriage, but I resent people
playing political football with our religious beliefs,"
said Representative Ron Sailor Jr., a Democrat whose suburban
Atlanta district contains some of the state's largest and most
conservative black churches.

PROTESTANTS
FOR THE COMMON GOOD -- The Presidential Prayer Team is currently
urging us to: "Pray for the President as he seeks wisdom
on how to legally codify the definition of marriage. Pray that
it will be according to Biblical principles. With any forces
insisting on variant definitions of marriage, pray that God's
Word and His standards will be honored by our government."
This is true.

Any
good religious person believes prayer should be balanced by action.
So here, in support of the Prayer Team's admirable goals, is
a proposed Constitutional Amendment codifying marriage entirely
on biblical principles:

A.
Marriage in the United States shall consist of a union between
one man and one or more women. (Gen 29:17-28; II Sam 3:2-5)

B.
Marriage shall not impede a man's right to take concubines, in
addition to his wife or wives. (II Sam 5:13; I Kings 11:3; II
Chron 11:21)

C.
A marriage shall be considered valid only if the wife is a virgin.
If the wife is not a virgin, she shall be executed. (Deut 22:13-21)

E.
Since marriage is for life, neither this Constitution nor the
constitution of any State, nor any state or federal law, shall
be construed to permit divorce. (Deut 22:19; Mark 10:9)

F.
If a married man dies without children, his brother shall marry
the widow. If he refuses to marry his brother's widow or deliberately
does not give her children, he shall pay a fine of one shoe,
and be otherwise punished in a manner to be determined by law.
(Gen. 38:6-10; Deut 25:5-10)

G.
In lieu of marriage, if there are no acceptable men in your town,
it is required that you get your dad drunk and have sex with
him (even if he had previously offered you up as a sex toy to
men young and old), tag-teaming with any sisters you may have.
Of course, this rule applies only if you are female. (Gen 19:31-36)

A
RECENT exchange on the DC History bulletin board on why Washington
attracted so many weddings reveals just how the sanctity of marriage
used to be observed in the nation's capital right under the nose
of the sort of legislators now demanding a constitutional amendment
to preserve the sanctity of marriage.

MICHAEL
WASSERMAN - Based on my review of the statute applicable between
1901 and 1925, it seems to me that the reason was the combination
of (1) the slight requirements for obtaining a marriage license;
(2) the absence of any waiting period or residency requirement;
(3) the apparent validity under D.C. law of even an unlicensed
marriage; (4) the rather small penalty imposed on the officiant
of an unlicensed marriage (up to a $500 fine, no possibility
of jail); (5) the apparent absence of any penalty on the parties
to an unlicensed marriage; (6) the low age of consent for a valid
marriage (16 for males and 14 for females); (7) the absence of
any requirement for witnesses. . .

Section
1291 specified the requirements for obtaining a license from
the clerk of the court. All that was needed was for the parties
to answer under oath a series of questions regarding their identity
and capacity to marry each other: ages, consanguinity, prior
marriage, parental consent if under age (21 for men, 18 for women).
If the questions are answered correctly, the clerk must issue
a license.

Section
1288 allowed marriages to be celebrated by any "minister
of the gospel"--who needn't be a resident of the District--"authorized
by any justice of the supreme court of the District of Columbia,"
which was the trial court with general jurisdiction. The 1904
amendment made provision for members of religious societies "which
does not by its custom require the intervention of a minister
for celebration of marriages."

There
doesn't seem to have even been a requirement that the marriage
be witnessed by anyone other than the officiant.

Moreover,
if the boy were between 16 and 21 or the girl between 14 and
18, but didn't have parental consent, they could still get married
without a license as long as they found a "minister of the
gospel" (previously authorized by a justice) who was willing
to run the risk of a $500 fine, imposed by section 1290. (Of
course, the minister was likely to be the only resident of the
District who witnessed the "crime," although even that
wasn't necessarily so.)

Sections
1283 and 1284 specify which marriages are absolutely void or
merely voidable after judicial decree. Neither includes the absence
of a license. Only purported marriages involving incest or bigamy
were absolutely ineffectual. Marriages could be judicially declared
void based only on mental or physical incapacity (i.e., inability
to consent to or consummate a marriage) or if consent of a party
was obtained by fraud. The fourth paragraph of section 1284 (added
in 1902) specifically declares the age of consent to marriage
to be 16 for males and 14 for females, and makes marriages in
which one party is under age voidable at the suit of the party.

Section
1290 is the only section dealing with the consequence of the
absence of a license. It provided: "No person authorized
hereby to celebrate the rites of marriage shall do so in any
case without first having delivered to him a license therefor
addressed to him issued from the clerk's office ..., under a
penalty of not more than five hundred dollars, in the discretion
of the court, to be recovered upon information in the police
court of the District." In fact, it may have been possible
for anyone to "celebrate" a valid marriage, because
section 1289 provides that anyone without proper authorization
under section 1288 was subject merely to a $500 fine as well.
It does not address whether the marriage so celebrated was or
was not otherwise valid.

So,
if you wanted to get married quickly and with a minimum of fuss
-- and questions, D.C. was the place to be.

WILLIAM
WRIGHT - Thanks to all of you who had information about what
would have made DC the East Coast version of Las Vegas, and some
additional research confirmed most of the suggestions you made.
Though there were couples from Pennsylvania and elsewhere, including
New York, the majority of those coming here seemed to be from
Virginia; there was even what the Post called the "Cupid
Special," a train from Richmond that arrived every spring
for more than twenty years. Most women on the train who were
identified were under 21, but there were some exceptions.

WILLIAM
O. BEEMAN, PACIFIC NEWS SERVICE - There are at least three ways
one might try to codify gender under law -- biologically, psychologically
and culturally. On close inspection, all of them fail.

Biologically,
one must choose either secondary sexual characteristics -- things
like facial hair for men or breast development for women -- or
genetic testing as defining markers of gender. Neither method
is clear-cut. Some women show male secondary characteristics,
and vice versa. Before puberty, things are not necessarily any
clearer. A significant proportion of all babies have ambiguous
gender development. It has been long-standing -- and now, increasingly,
controversial -- medical practice to surgically "reassign"
such babies shortly after birth so that they will have only one
set of sexual organs . . . .

Psychologically,
another dilemma for those who seek to codify gender is the condition
known as gender dysphoria, in which a person feels that their
true gender is the opposite of that in which they were born.
These individuals are often referred to as "transgendered."
Some experts estimate as many as 1.2 million Americans are transgendered.
Gender dysphoria is a matter of personal identity and has nothing
to do with sexual orientation. A male-to-female transgendered
person may be attracted to women or to men. . . .

Finally,
human societies around the world recognize individuals who are
culturally female or culturally male no matter what their physical
gender. The "berdache" is an umbrella term used by
Europeans to designate a man who is culturally classified as
a woman, and who may be a "wife" to another man. The
practice is perhaps best known among the Zuñ Indians of
Arizona, but is widely seen in other tribal groups as well. Outside
of North America, the hijra of India, a cultural "third
gender," is important in ceremonial life. Hijra are classified
as "neither man nor woman,"

THE
SANCTITY OF MARRIAGE

IT
is our view that gay marriages are an extremely important issue,
but if we're going to make marriage sacred we have to deal with
some even more critical ones first. Therefore we are launching
a campaign for a constitutional amendment that would require
the death penalty for the following:

-
A woman who is not a virgin at the time of the marriage

-
Anyone who commits adultery.

-
Any couple that dissolves their marriage by divorce.

One
we've gotten these matters taken care of, we can turn our attention
to all those claims of mutual commitment by gays and lesbians.

McClellan
: "What I'm telling you is that the president has always
believed marriage is a sacred institution between a man and a
woman; that it is an institution that should be protected."

The
final tally? When discussing gay marriage McClellan employed
the phrase "sacred institution" nine times during the
36-minute briefing. Close cousins "enduring institution"
and "enduring and lasting institution" made eleven
appearances.

While
McClellan and his talking point may not have killed off the concept
that Bush had in fact changed his mind about whether gay marriage
was a state or federal issue (see the next day's Houston Chronicle),
he did press the corps to get increasingly creative with their
questions.

Highlights?

Would
the president "like to see ... Britney Spears behave herself?"

Even
that didn't faze McClellan. What did, however, was a question
from the redoubtable Helen Thomas, who has been doing this for,
oh, longer than some reporters present have been alive. Thomas
finally nudged McClellan, however briefly, off his rote spiel:

Thomas:
"What does [the president] think the penalty should be,
[gay people who marry] should go to jail if they break this law
that eventually he hopes to have?"

McClellan:
"The president believes that we should protect and defend
the sanctity of marriage, Helen. That's what this is about. And
there are people --"

Thomas:
"They should go to jail?"

McClellan:
"No, Helen, that's not the way the president is looking
at it."